Current mechanical and electronic voting systems that do not involve physical alteration of ballot material by the voter do not provide for voter verification of the correctness of his or her own vote. Current voting systems that do involve physical alteration of ballot material by the voter to effect voting are subject to erroneous or incompetent handling by the voter. When such erroneous or incompetent handling by the voter occurs, the mechanical or electronic means for counting the votes on the ballot are affected, and the ballot may be rejected or the counting otherwise rendered inaccurate or suspect. The circumstance of ballot rejection or inconsistent mechanical tabulation in the case of erroneous or incompetent handling by the voter often requires manual examination of ballots, which is not only laborious and subject to its own inaccuracies, but is also inherently fraught with difficulty in maintaining the integrity of the election process. The principal object of the present invention is to provide a voter with a printed ballot prepared by a computer station and printer from input by the voter which completely and accurately presents the votes of the voter, and which is in a familiar form for easy review of his or her vote by the voter, so that machine and human error may be detected and corrected before the ballot is finally submitted by the voter for tabulation with the votes of other voters.
There is no prior art that this invention builds upon except its generic relationship to the well-known concept of electronic and mechanical voting machines, including those which produce a permanent paper record in addition to direct electronic and mechanical tabulation. However, there does not appear to be any prior art which combines accurate electronic or mechanical preparation of a printed ballot with an opportunity for review of the ballot by the voter and mechanical or electronic comparison of the printed ballot with the data stored from the voter input.
The present invention has elements that may be considered to be covered generally by class 235, particularly subclass 51 covering machines employed for casting and counting votes.